OVC Basketball: Ranking of 25 best players from last decade (2013-23)

25. Parker Stewart

Nobody has ever had a collegiate career that was the journey Stewart endured. A 6’5 wing from Union City, Tennessee, he spent his freshman season at Pittsburgh but transferred after Kevin Stallings was fired. After sitting out a season, he played under his father Anthony as a redshirt sophomore at Tennessee-Martin but sat out the following year after his father’s death. Stewart then played a year at Indiana before transferring back to UT Martin, giving him two pretty solid years in the OVC.

We’re just focusing on those two seasons on the court with the Skyhawks, and he was pretty excellent in those years. In that first season, Stewart averaged 19.2 points, 4.6 rebounds, and 3.8 assists and was the star of the show for the program, with four different 30-point performances. Three seasons later, he was back for his senior year and was excellent again, leading UT Martin to a 3rd place finish while averaging 16.1 points and hitting 37% of his 3-pointers.

Stewart was just Second Team All-OVC in 2020 but finally earned those First Team honors three seasons later. His journey was truly tragic and unique, but you can’t deny that he put up some great numbers with the Skyhawks. A solid scorer, he was one of the best long-range shooters in the OVC during those two seasons, and the program was better off with him around.